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In a story in UPI-Beta, Manchester Police who raided a criminal gang's hideout scooped up a 3-D printer and a host of parts that were said to be gun parts. The UK police have been up in arms over reports of printed guns made with the new and cheap 3-D printer technology. If this becomes a real threat, their handgun ban isn't worth the paper is was printed on. Making a real gun on 3-D printers is a real challenge, as it is hard even to make a decent water bottle cap that doesn't leak.

In the end, this was all moot, as the printed parts turned out to be more 3-D printer parts themselves, according to GigaOhm's blog. It was also reported that the street price for a real gun was around 200 US dollars in Manchester. I'd go for the real gun.

And did all quite well. He was descended from a well received line of shooters and gunmakers, stretching back to the late 1700's. His grandfather won many awards as the top shooter of the Independent Dublin Volunteers. John took over the family business of gunmaking on the death of his father in 1858. His rifles are legendary, and had achieved local fame in Dublin, but were soon to be showcased on a larger stage, Wimbledon and Creedmoor for shooting contests, and Africa, as the taker of big game.

John Rigby

In 1860 John invented the coiled brass case, used by Snider firearms, an important step to the introduction of the drawn brass case. Colonel Boxer used this case for the Snider, denying they came from John Rigby who was but an Irishman, but his patent stands for itself. His rifles went against the best at the time at the shooting contests at Wimbledon, where the NRA had just started shooting contests to get it's country's riflemen in shape. His rifles won the Queen's Prize in 1865. He was chosen, along with 7 other Irishmen to go to Creedmoor to shoot against the Americans. It was as close a contest as it gets.... the Irish lost the match by 3 points, with Rigby being the highest scoring shooter for the Irish. The Irish used Rigby rifles exclusively, and the Americans a mixture of Remington and Sharps rifles. Before going home, the leader of the Irish Team, Arthur Leech, presented a fine grade Rigby Rifle to General Custer, whose command shortly came to grief at the Little Big Horn, and the rifle disappeared.

Rigby Label by Wikimedia contributor Bisselbite

1887 Became superintendent of the Enfield Small Arms Factory. He oversaw the introduction of the Lee Enfield, and the development of the small bore cartridge. At the time, the Lee Enfield Magazine System rifle suffered early erosion failure of the Metford designed barrels. Rigby designed the rifling for it's successor, and while not mitigating the problem completely, did give satisfactory barrel life. He was shortly booted from Enfield due to the age rule, around 60 or 65 years of age was the limit for working at Enfield.

Mauser based Rigby by Flickr contributor Mosi Lager

Towards the end, Rigby realized that as a modern rifle went, it would be hard to beat the Mauser system, and to that end, a number of game rifles have reached a sort of legendary status. Also introducing the cordite .416 and .450 Rigby cartridge, loaded with solid nickel covered bullets in a double gun would take the largest African game animals. The last Rigby that ran the company died in 1951. Since then the company changed hands in a somewhat bewildering fashion, only to be bought my Mauser. Seems a fitting end.

Latest Comments

Actually I've learned the trick for getting original De Lisle and "Exact replica" to feed and function very well.Have repaired several replicas in addition to making my own improved version.It takes a modification to the top of the magazine well that creates a feed-ramp similar to a 1911.The barrel feed ramp also has to be moved forward to correct the feed into the chamber.After my repairs they will even feed hollow-point rounds.Replicas I have seen also have an error in the ejector - bolt head.Once that is corrected they can work very well.

Really no reason accuracy should be poor unless the barrel or baffle alignment is bad.

I inherited a .303 rifle from my Dad who in turn inherited it from his Dad. It is a sporting .303 not a cut down military weapon, it has a shotgun style slide safety catch The serial number of the action is 8966 but it has a new barrel fitted in 1986 which has only fired about 40 rounds of ammunition.

I would like to know how old it is, the anecdotes indicate it was a wedding present in 1901